So anyway I did an upgrade from Windows 7 to windows 8 (I wish I hadn't bothered, but that's another matter). However since I did this, whenever I try to delete an icon, or a file, or a folder, the icon for the item in question doesn't get deleted until I hit the refresh button. Does anyone have any ideas how to fix this?

That's weeks of work. Forget that! It took me 3 days just to get Windows 8 looking and working the way I wanted. Reinstalling dozens of apps and all my documents and folders would take weeks too. Right now it's small but irritating bug, but it doesn't warrant major surgery of this kind.

And forget about 'Windows easy Transfer' or other cr*ap like that, it never generally works as advertised. You are still left with a sh*t load of work to do.

weeks? your doing it wrong, a fresh install should not take more than a few hours

And you are on drugs mate. What have you got, two or 3 apps installed on your system? Everything else pretty much set on default?. My system is nothing like that. I spent the last 2 years using my system before upgrading to Win 8 to get it to work just the way I liked - and then maybe the last 3 weeks on and off getting Windows 8 to work the way I like too.

Any half-baked oaf can install a default Windows system in under a few hours. That is not the issue in this case.

Yes, you will have to reinstall your desktop software, however, all of your apps, settings, documents, and files will remain as they are. So unless you really ****ed stuff up, all you should have to do is reinstall software. If that takes you weeks, you need to learn to computer.

And you are on drugs mate. What have you got, two or 3 apps installed on your system? Everything else pretty much set on default?. My system is nothing like that. I spent the last 2 years using my system before upgrading to Win 8 to get it to work just the way I liked - and then maybe the last 3 weeks on and off getting Windows 8 to work the way I like too.

Any half-baked oaf can install a default Windows system in under a few hours. That is not the issue in this case.

Easy there jebus, you ask for suggestions and got them. No need to name call or accuse other members of drug use, is there?

If it took me that long to set my system up it'd be imaged up to the minute, I would also install everything other than Windows (and Windows crap) on a different partition or better yet a different drive. A hdd drive crash for you sounds like a major operation, I can have my system down and up in a bout 20 minutes... but then I image my drive often and have everything stored on a different drive on the machine and backed up twice on two different usb drives. I might EVEN BE MORE CAREFUL, if it took me 2 years getting an os "just the way I liked".

The issue is that a folder's contents are not properly auto-refreshed, when a new file/folder is created, or an existing file/folder is placed into the folder, or an existing file/folder is deleted from the folder
... right?

It's a Windows 7 bug, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was happening in Windows 8 as well.
I believe it has to do with the folder being included in a library, or the user is viewing a "library folder".

Assuming your folder is somehow related to a library, you might try excluding some folders from the library, testing for the issue, then bringing the folders back into the library, and retesting.
Oh, and post your results! I'm interested too!

Yes, you will have to reinstall your desktop software, however, all of your apps, settings, documents, and files will remain as they are. So unless you really ****ed stuff up, all you should have to do is reinstall software. If that takes you weeks, you need to learn to computer.

which would make sense if he has tweaked it to death and done all these "customization's" possibly that is what caused the problem in the first place.

Forget it guys I'm not reinstalling my system, or spending countless hours re-imaging cr*ap, just for it sometimes to work and sometimes not to work. Please stop distracting from the topic. As I said this is a small but irritating bug, but not one I feel that warrants major reconstructive surgery,

Apart from this small bug, I have my desktop and my account set up exactly the way I want it and I won't be changing it for anyone. The only thing t would consider reinstalling for is if the system broke down completely. I spent 15 years updating and reinstalling windows on maybe thousands of systems. It bores me now and I have no interest in it at all. The way you guys make it sound it's like backing up and reinstalling, or imaging a system is always 100% reliable and will always provide the solution to any given problem. Well the fact of the matter is if you really did understand technology, you would know that it isn't always 100% reliable and is not guaranteed to resolve the problem at all. It might and it might not. But it's still a hell of a lot of work to find that out.

And the guy who keeps going on about 'doing a desktop refresh' if you mean hit F5, then please re-read my initial post. What exactly do you think I have been doing? Lol.

This to me seems like a simple bug. I know some of you guys are keen to help and I appreciate this. But I would prefer sensible answers only please.

And yes my system is heavily customised, although I think 'personalised' is a better description. But no more than you would expect of someone with over 20 years experience working with a large numbers of computer clusters in my job for a major UK university. Despite this, this is not a bug I have ever come across previously.